Tempter’s Sacrament – Temptation Steel Scourge

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In 2020, old school Thrash Metal duo TEMPTER’S SACRAMENT released their two-track demo, “Putrid Triumph,” on NVNM. One year later—October 1, to be exact—they released their debut EP, “Temptation Steel Scourge,” through Invictus Productions. It comprises their rerecorded demo tracks, one new original track, and a cover of MORBID ANGEL’s “Unholy Blasphemies.” The album hearkens back to 80’s Thrash, infused with core elements of Thrash, Death, and Black. Even the album cover says unfiltered, unrefined evil. In short, awesome album.

The album has all the markers of no-frills extreme metal—heavy analog vibe, abandoned cellar production quality, db never out of the red, painfully distorted riffs, punishing drums, and screeching vocals from the guts of hell. The downside is the total runtime is less than 15 minutes—but then again, this rabid aggression is well suited for short burst albums, so it works quite well. With only four tracks, it’s hard to single out the standout tracks. The two rerecorded tracks have the benefit of evolving and improving over time. The new original track, “Temptation Steel Scourge,” is actually the title track and deservedly so. The cover track, “Unholy Blasphemies,” gives due homage to the masters, shortening the already short track by almost ten seconds and somehow making it even more visceral, I think mostly due to the striped down production. So, yeah, all the tracks are standout tracks.

Thematically, I don’t know that the album has any particular concept or agenda—I mean, other than rendering dark, violent carnage. “Megiddo Ecstasy” is either a reference to the actual ancient city of Megiddo or the figurative event of Armageddon or both. Lyrically, who the hell knows. I couldn’t understand a word, but I can tell you these aren’t love songs. Altogether, TEMPTER’S SACRAMENT lays down some uncompromising, aggressive underground metal. A solid debut for this New Jersey band. Hopefully we’ll see a full-length album sometime soon. In the meantime we have 15 minutes of mayhem to enjoy.

Songwriting: 7
Musicianship: 7
Memorability: 7
Production: 6